This week, we’re highlighting one of the drinks that’s especially fun to make on our current menu. That is, if you like playing with gadgets and layering flavors together!

Many people have a Sodastream, which enables you to carbonate water at home. I wanted to find something that would enable us to carbonate cocktails, not just water, and serve them that way. A few bars in Chicago and other cities even serve kegged cocktails, but we’re not really big enough to justify a kegged cocktail program. Then I found this article on Wired about the Drink Mate. A few shipping boxes later, we had our very own Drink Mate, along with several bottles designed to hold the carbonated beverages.

Over the summer, I played around with it a fair bit to see what it could do. I carbonated straight vodka, various juices, and some other cocktails before arriving at one of our new favorites. The carbonation adds a new layer of flavor in the drink.

Here’s a recipe for the liter carbonation bottle, which makes about 5 drinks total. You can cut it in half if you want to make a half liter (2-3 drinks).

Carbonate with the Drink Mate to your desired fizziness level (I like it fizzy, so I press the button for three long holds, giving a few seconds in between for the bubbles to die down). Let it rest/let the excess air out as per the device’s instructions, and then remove the carbonator top and replace with the bottle top. Store in refrigerator for up to 1 week – the flavors keep surprisingly well once carbonated!

If you have enough bottles, you can even carbonate cocktails ahead of time for a party! We did that recently for a big event here at the distillery, and it worked out great.